Your child struggling with obesity? Whole-fat milk can make kids leaner

Struggling to reduce obesity in your kid? Opt for whole milk. A new study shows drinking whole milk may make kids leaner and increase their vitamin D levels, in comparison to low-fat or skimmed milk.

Struggling to reduce obesity in your kid? Opt for whole milk. A new study shows drinking whole milk may make kids leaner and increase their vitamin D levels, in comparison to low-fat or skimmed milk.

In the study, children who drank whole milk (containing 3.25% fat content) had a body mass index (BMI) score of 0.72 units lower than those who drank one or two per cent low-fat milk. That’s comparable to the difference between having a healthy weight and being overweight, said lead author Jonathon Maguire, pediatrician at St. Michael’s Hospital in Ontario, Canada.

It may be because children who drank full-fat milk were likely to end up less hungry, making them less likely to snack on high calorie foods, the researchers explained. Further, children who drank one cup of whole milk each day had better vitamin D levels -- known to protects bones and immune system -- than those who drank nearly three times as much skimmed milk.

This could be because vitamin D is fat soluble, meaning it dissolves in fat rather than water. Milk with higher fat content therefore contains more vitamin D. “Children who drink lower fat milk don’t have less body fat, and they also don’t benefit from the higher vitamin D levels in whole milk,” Maguire said, adding “it’s a double negative with low fat milk.”